Some of you may have seen some threads I've posted in OT about my quest to become a cheapass. (Long story short, ultimate goal is to reduce monthly expenses to buy a house in Fall 08/ Spring 09.)
I've managed to adjust my driving habits a bit that I can now go slightly over two weeks without filling up my 97 Nissan Sentra. This is a shade over 360 miles per tank, roughly 28-32MPG.
I have to get gas before I head off to work Monday morning and I don't have much to do tomorrow, so I was wondering what you guys think of maybe removing some unneeded parts from my car in an attempt to raise my MPG a bit. IE: Back seat, glove box assembly, maybe the front passenger seat... a few small "here and there's"... I might go as far as to ditch my spare tires and jumper cables because I have AAA Gold service.
It's probably not going to be a permanent thing... just for a tank of gas or two or until prices start to go down a teeny bit.
I kinda wanna see if I can hit about 37MPG for a savings about $7/fill up (I think?).
I just got an oil change, checked my tire pressure & changed my air filter today. Hopefully I'll see a slight improvement just because of that.
Edit: Let me clarify that the biggest reason I'm doing this is just for a fun experiment. I had nothing better to do today and taking some parts out and cleaning my car out took me about an hour. I think if I wanted to get picky I could take some of the trim off... remove the rear speakers in a matter of minutes... etc... but that's taking it way to far and I think the extra 10lbs there would do NOTHING.
Poll included.
UPDATE:
I'm hovering around half a tank right now. The day after I took my seat out I had to make a trip with a few other passengers for about 60 miles, and I took another trip in a hill-laden part of town for an extra 40 miles out of the norm. I'm not getting an accurate idea of how much I'm saving because of that, so I WILL go for another tank.
As it stands, factoring that in, I'm sitting around 220 miles for that half tank. Assuming the gauge is accurate, That'll be roughly 440 miles off of a 13 gallon tank (and I'd expect that the lower end of the tank will yield a slightly (and I mean that quite literally) better MPG because of the lower weight from carrying less fuel. That puts me at around 34MPG so far. I know I can do better, too. I'm doing a much better job of learning where my car can coast, timing out lights so I have to hit the brakes less, etc.
Ideally the golden rule that I've read is that anytime you're converting gasoline into friction or brake dust, you might as well just toss some change out the window.
I haven't managed to piss anyone off driving a bit slower and I only get to work a minute or two later than normal (which means I just nef before leaving a minute or two less.
)
Considering that gas will probably hit $4.00 in my area within a month, I think after I'm done with this little test I'll start taking the bus to work.
UPDATE 5/27
I ended up filling up again Tuesday night last week (5/20) before gas prices jumped from $3.75 to $3.99. I put about 12 gallons (roughly) in and had about 400 miles on my trip odometer. I did the math for my MPG with the exact numbers on the receipt and it came out to a shade below 34MPG. All in all, this was some good progress because with that much left, I could have gone to work at least one more day (probably.) Considering the two unexpected trips, I got one day extra than I normally do. Granted, the number of days was also influenced by my using my car less, but obviously the less often I have to fill up, the less money I spend, which is the goal.
Fast Forward to yesterday. I paid a visit to my parents about 30 miles away and found a gas station that still hadn't updated their prices since the previous spike, so I figured I'd top myself off since it was on my way. My trip odometer read 128.8 miles, and I put 3.108 gallons in my tank. Now, maybe I suck REALLY bad at math... but that's somehow 41.4 MPG???? WTF where did that come from???? I know the two trips mentioned in the previous post that might have hurt my mileage wouldn't have had that much of a difference, right? The only other possibility is that one of the two pumps I used was rigged to swindle customers already paying for craploads of gas, but in both cases the needle went to the top of gas gauge. What gives? I shit you not with these numbers... is that really possible?
My brother, who ALSO has a 97 Sentra is now doing similar things and is reporting about 35-37 MPG.
I've managed to adjust my driving habits a bit that I can now go slightly over two weeks without filling up my 97 Nissan Sentra. This is a shade over 360 miles per tank, roughly 28-32MPG.
I have to get gas before I head off to work Monday morning and I don't have much to do tomorrow, so I was wondering what you guys think of maybe removing some unneeded parts from my car in an attempt to raise my MPG a bit. IE: Back seat, glove box assembly, maybe the front passenger seat... a few small "here and there's"... I might go as far as to ditch my spare tires and jumper cables because I have AAA Gold service.
It's probably not going to be a permanent thing... just for a tank of gas or two or until prices start to go down a teeny bit.
I kinda wanna see if I can hit about 37MPG for a savings about $7/fill up (I think?).
I just got an oil change, checked my tire pressure & changed my air filter today. Hopefully I'll see a slight improvement just because of that.
Edit: Let me clarify that the biggest reason I'm doing this is just for a fun experiment. I had nothing better to do today and taking some parts out and cleaning my car out took me about an hour. I think if I wanted to get picky I could take some of the trim off... remove the rear speakers in a matter of minutes... etc... but that's taking it way to far and I think the extra 10lbs there would do NOTHING.
Poll included.
UPDATE:
I'm hovering around half a tank right now. The day after I took my seat out I had to make a trip with a few other passengers for about 60 miles, and I took another trip in a hill-laden part of town for an extra 40 miles out of the norm. I'm not getting an accurate idea of how much I'm saving because of that, so I WILL go for another tank.
As it stands, factoring that in, I'm sitting around 220 miles for that half tank. Assuming the gauge is accurate, That'll be roughly 440 miles off of a 13 gallon tank (and I'd expect that the lower end of the tank will yield a slightly (and I mean that quite literally) better MPG because of the lower weight from carrying less fuel. That puts me at around 34MPG so far. I know I can do better, too. I'm doing a much better job of learning where my car can coast, timing out lights so I have to hit the brakes less, etc.
Ideally the golden rule that I've read is that anytime you're converting gasoline into friction or brake dust, you might as well just toss some change out the window.
I haven't managed to piss anyone off driving a bit slower and I only get to work a minute or two later than normal (which means I just nef before leaving a minute or two less.
)Considering that gas will probably hit $4.00 in my area within a month, I think after I'm done with this little test I'll start taking the bus to work.
UPDATE 5/27
I ended up filling up again Tuesday night last week (5/20) before gas prices jumped from $3.75 to $3.99. I put about 12 gallons (roughly) in and had about 400 miles on my trip odometer. I did the math for my MPG with the exact numbers on the receipt and it came out to a shade below 34MPG. All in all, this was some good progress because with that much left, I could have gone to work at least one more day (probably.) Considering the two unexpected trips, I got one day extra than I normally do. Granted, the number of days was also influenced by my using my car less, but obviously the less often I have to fill up, the less money I spend, which is the goal.
Fast Forward to yesterday. I paid a visit to my parents about 30 miles away and found a gas station that still hadn't updated their prices since the previous spike, so I figured I'd top myself off since it was on my way. My trip odometer read 128.8 miles, and I put 3.108 gallons in my tank. Now, maybe I suck REALLY bad at math... but that's somehow 41.4 MPG???? WTF where did that come from???? I know the two trips mentioned in the previous post that might have hurt my mileage wouldn't have had that much of a difference, right? The only other possibility is that one of the two pumps I used was rigged to swindle customers already paying for craploads of gas, but in both cases the needle went to the top of gas gauge. What gives? I shit you not with these numbers... is that really possible?
My brother, who ALSO has a 97 Sentra is now doing similar things and is reporting about 35-37 MPG.
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